Developing a Shipping List!

A while ago I read ‘Linchpin’ by Seth Godin – a brilliant book. I’ve read a few of his books now – I also liked ‘Poke the Box’ which was part of a new publishing project which he ran throughout last year in partnership with Amazon. He is always pushing the boundaries and getting his readers to think out beyond their comfort zones.

One of the concepts he explores which I find really interesting is the idea that we constantly need to overcome resistance. And we do this by shipping. Getting past the inner critic. Thus, with any type of project it is key that we push on and through the resistance until the project is ready to ship. In other words, complete it and share it. Don’t aim for perfection.

Well, with this concept very much in mind the last time I met with my coach, we looked at how I can get a lot of the ‘open loops’ sorted. I have a lot of manuscripts unfinished. They create a drag with my energy, incomplete projects looking for a final burst of energy. So, we developed the idea of the ‘Shipping List’ – and then it struck me that if I can clear my ‘Shipping List’ I could then create a ‘Shipping Forecast’ with ideas for new writing projects. This has been incredibly motivating. I pulled together a ‘Shipping List’ and it had 13 items on it. This includes a couple of poetry collections, the book of the PhD thesis, a book on change, collected works of my poetry from the last 25 years, coaching tips, a new novel and a booklet about Buddhism. A really eclectic mix of ideas – and one that I need to conclude and sign off without being too precious about some of the ideas.

I’ve been working on the list over the last week or so, and I already have one manuscript (made up of the two poetry collections) virtually finished, a short coaching tips booklet to edit. It’s really exciting to find that I can pull together and ship at a real pace to get through the Shipping List. I will keep you posted as I progress the lists.